‘Scene’ on a Day Out to Lichfield

This set of images is to illustrate an article written for a community magazine called ‘all Things Local’ which is distributed widely in central Derbyshire around the towns of Belper and Ripley.

 

Produced and distributed from a base at Kilburn it is a goldmine of information relating to local services and things to do in the area.

 

My contribution has been a series of articles encouraging people to get out and about by bus and showing them how to go about it.

 

Lichfield is reached by three bus journeys from either Belper or Ripley.

 

Depending on where you start your journey, initially to Derby you will probably travel on ‘trentbarton’ (tb) ‘the sixes’ from Belper or the ‘red arrow’ or ‘the nines’ from Ripley.

 

For many years the ‘red arrow' has linked Chesterfield with Nottingham direct. That has now altered. A change of bus is now required in Derby as the route has been split mainly due to timekeeping issues.

 

‘the sixes’ is run with a dedicated fleet of Swedish built Scania’s fitted with Irish built bodies by Wright’s at Balymena.

 

One of them is seen here passing the Rutland Arms Hotel in Bakewell.

 

‘tb’ have recently ordered new coaches for the ‘red arrow’ which will feature chassis built by Volvo (another Swedish company) bodied by Plaxton of Scarborough.

 

There is currently a much older Volvo/Plaxton coach in service dating from the mid 1990’s. I have included it in this line up because when the new vehicles appear, it will most likely be withdrawn.

 

The buses on ‘the nines’ are built by a company called Optare who are based in Yorkshire.

 

The service from Derby to Lichfield (the X38) is a joint operation belong run by both ‘tb’ and ‘Arriva’. Both operators use basically the same livery.

 

‘tb’s allocation of vehicles are usually Optare Tempo’s again built in Yorkshire whilst ‘Arriva’ generally uses Wright of Balymena built buses but carried by Dutch built VDL chassis. VDL being the current name for the company that was previously known as DAF.

 

The journey to and from Lichfield is in the hands of ‘midland classic’ a relatively new operator only dating from 2005. 

Being a small operator, a variety of vehicles might be expected but in my experience the service is usually run with Wright bodied Scania’s again. 

 

These normally carry ‘Flyer’ branding. The route traveling mainly on the A38 at what might be described as a ‘brisk’ speed.